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ExForce 1: Columbus Day
Author Summary We were fighting on the wrong side, of a war we couldn't win. And that was the good news. The Ruhar hit us on Columbus Day. There we were, innocently drifting along the cosmos on our little blue marble, like the native Americans in 1492. Over the horizon come ships of a technologically advanced, aggressive culture, and BAM! There go the good old days, when humans only got killed by each other. So, Columbus Day. It fits. When the morning sky twinkled again, this time with Kristang starships jumping in to hammer the Ruhar, we thought we were saved. The UN Expeditionary Force hitched a ride on Kristang ships to fight the Ruhar, wherever our new allies thought we could be useful. So, I went from fighting with the US Army in Nigeria, to fighting in space. It was lies, all of it. We shouldn't even be fighting the Ruhar, they aren't our enemy, our allies are. I'd better start at the beginning.... Plot Summary **MAJOR SPOILERS** This page is intended to serve as a high level series recap for the Expeditionary Force books. It is not intended as a complete synopsis but instead to refresh on key plot points in previous books that continue to be referenced. * An alien civilization named the Ruhar attack earth without warning, destroying critical infrastructure. * The human response is negligible due to the overwhelming technological capabilities of the Ruhar. * Another alien species, The Kristang, arrive and fight off the Ruhar on behalf of the humans. * The Kristang enlist the humans as a client-species in an on-going intergalactic war against the Ruhar and other species. * The newly formed United Nations Expeditionary Force (UNEF) is taken to a planet called 'Camp Alpha' to train in atmospheric and non-atmospheric military tactics. The humans lack any sort of faster than light (FTL) space travel capability and they are entirely dependent on the Kristang (and the Kristang's overlords the Thurannin) for interstellar travel. * After completing their training, the UNEF is sent to a planet called 'Paradise' which the Ruhar control. Their mission is to evacuate the planet, which has been ceded to the Kristang as part of terms in a ceasefire. * Joe Bishop, a US Army Specialist (E-4) from Earth, is Team Leader of a fireteam monitoring a small set of Ruhar villages. * The Ruhar attempt an up-rising against the joint Kristang-Human occupying force. This uprising ultimately fails and Joe Bishop, who shot down two key Ruhar ground assault transport ships, is commended by the Kristang for his actions and awarded the theater rank of colonel (O-6). * It becomes increasingly clear that the Kristang are a barbaric race and care little for humans beyond using them as expendable soldiers. It also becomes clear that Humans as a species share more in common with the Ruhar than they had realized. * Joe Bishop is ordered by the Kristang to execute unarmed Ruhar civilians as a retributive action. He refuses and is jailed by the Kristang, pending execution. * The Ruhar re-invade Paradise and, in the ensuing bombardment, Joe is able to escape from his cell. * He rescues several other humans also scheduled for execution by surprising and overpowering the Kristang guards. * He is later captured by the Ruhar, who use a storage facility as a makeshift prison. * A sentient AI, who Joe dubs 'Skippy' helps Joe escape the facility by deactivating electronics and weapons of the Ruhar and rejoin the other humans he had escaped with from the Kristang prison. * Skippy subsequently helps the humans hijack a Thurannin Star-Carrier (the 'patron' species of the Kristang) and Joe leads a small band of humans off Paradise. * It becomes clear that Skippy is technologically far superior to anything the Ruhar, Kristang or Thurannin have. With abilities including being able to hijack and control virtually any networked system with ease and being able to warp the fabric of space-time itself. His creators, 'The Elders' existed millions of years before the current species were a space-faring civilization. Skippy's programming prevents him from sharing advanced Elder technology with space-faring civilizations and thus, he has been prevented from even communicating with the Ruhar on Paradise or any other species (for the past millions of years). Since Humans are not space-faring and have no ability to transport themselves around the galaxy without the aid of either another species, Skippy's restrictions do not apply. This is why he was able to speak to Joe on paradise. * Skippy further reveals he has no memory of: ** How he ended up on Paradise; ** What happened to the Elders; ** Why he has lost large parts of his memory and unknown functionality (Even with this loss of functionality, Skippy is significantly more powerful than any other technology possessed by any species); *Skippy uses the ships FTL capability to jump the ship to a wormhole, which takes the ship (and its crew) back to earth. Category:Books